May 1, 2024 Day 2

Many of us remember a favourite high school teacher but few of us have kept in touch with them for that 50+ years since graduation. With an approximate 30 year gap immediately following leaving high school, my English teacher, Mr. Ken Reeder and I re-connected. He was an inspiration to me and is probably one of the main reasons I am a writer today.

We were fortunate spending the better part of the day getting a personalized tour of UBC from Ken. It's an amazing campus, not to mention huge. 

BC provincial flower the dogwood

Several of the buildings made use of BC forest products incorporating the big wood instead of concrete and steel for supporting trusses and beams. 

the reconciliation pole

Blue Whale skeleton from PEI

the Learning Centre had a very Medieval look to it in my mind

Ken treated us to a marvelous lunch at the University Golf Club.

Kudos and a huge shout out to Ken Reeder for a fabulous day!

BC 2024

April 30, 2024        Day 1

A 2 1/2 hour of waiting then a 4 1/2 flight was enough of an ordeal for me. Hell, that's longer than I sleep some nights. Believe me, when flying getting there is NOT half the fun. I suppose I shouldn't complain. If we were driving we'd just be cruising in to Sault Ste Marie in that time.

We were supposed to leave at 2pm but didn't get airborne until 2:30. 15 minutes into the flight Karen was already bored having read both the menu and the safety instructions. We're flying Swoop which is Westjet's no frill subsidiary - no frills on an airline that already offered no frills.

We did pay a premium for their Extended Comfort service. It was well worth it - far more legroom, quick on and off process and a free alcoholic beverage. I got a free glass of wine and cookies and so did Karen so I got 2 free glasses of wine - and they were 200ml glasses. Came in a small bottle so I saved one for dinner.

It was totally overcast for most of the flight but the window seat premium paid off as we approached touch down in Vancouver. This is going to be sweet.

We're staying in a guesthouse somewhere in Vancouver. I have no idea where it is in relation to anything. Thank goodness for today's guidance technology or I would never have found it.

Good start. Enjoy the ride.

Maritimes Trip - Day 29

The last day of any journey for me is always the most difficult - there are so many wonderful memories and it hurts to face the fact that it is over. Today was just the drive from North Bay to home; about 4 hours but we stopped off for a couple of hours to visit a high school friend in Huntsville. That helped my transition because I have endearing memories of the good times I spent on the site where his house now sits.

The total distance for the trip was 7372.6 kilometres - I hate to think what that cost in gas! That said, it was worth every penny and every kilometre and I'd like nothing better than to do it all again. Thank you Gavin, Adrienne, Will and Evie and Adam, Rosemary, Logan, Ryder, Emmett and Violet for making this vacation one of the best and most memorable ever and thank you all for following along. I hope you enjoyed the ride.

Maritimes Trip - Day 28

 Today, unfortunately took us out of Quebec and back to Ontario to be greeted by that horrible slogan "Open For Business". Only Doug Ford could support this. "Yours To Discover" was timeless, this one is just dumb. The trip was pretty uneventful; relaxing to a point...

but the last few hours brought rain, truly torrential at times, the kind that your windshield wipers on maximum cannot clear.

We have landed in North Bay for our last night on the road - yes I took Karen to North Bay to celebrate her 70th birthday 😅 It's an improvement. I remember several years ago taking her to the dump on her birthday. What a romantic!

Sadly, tomorrow is our last day...

Maritimes Trip - Day 27

It was another one of those roller coaster days, both on the road (beautiful hills and curves) and just weird things happening. We woke up to find all the power in our room was out. All of it meant it was probably the whole house - which it was, in fact it was the whole town of Tadoussac. We were going to leave anyway, this just hastened our departure. That turned out to be a good thing. Even so, there was still time for a final farewell. I'd like to return in the fall sometime.

The very best part of our day took us through the gorgeous Saguenay region. I can't totally make up my mind but it certainly is a strong contender for my love of Quebec's Charlevoix region.

As we left Saguenay things started to look vaguely familiar. I know it's a neighbouring province but isn't this on the wrong side of the Quebec/Ontario border?

That's when things started to turn. I didn't like the place we had selected so, a whole other fiasco aside, we left and continued our drive. It was 5PM. There is precious little to choose from in these parts but we knew we would eventually find something. In the oh so travelling Whitehead way the first town of Senneterre was full. Just as well because dodgy would be too kind to describe the hotels/motels there. It was 9PM when we found a place in Val d'Or after being told at 4 places they were full as well. As is often the case, it was unexpectedly wonderful - that's oft times how we find the nicest places.

Maritimes Trip - Day 26

Despite the language barrier and occasional appearance of French arrogance Quebec is a beautiful province, Tomorrow may change my mind as we travel through the Saguenay but at the moment Charlevoix, without question, is my favourite part of the province.

We arrived in Saint Simeon around 10am - not exactly the way it was supposed to work out but here we are a day late.

...Even picked up a hitchhiker along the way.

This is a common summer sight to be sure, Perfect part of the country and we've seen it all along this trip, This is on the short ferry ride to Tadoussac...this one's for you Murray.

Tadoussac is gorgeous but it is oppressively hot at 33 degrees and high humidity, HOWEVER, this is the view from our balcony at the B&B.

Maritimes Trip - Day 25

Today started well and ended really well but in between - boy, what a frustrating mess. As we left our hotel in Florenceville I was impressed to see the commitment New Brunswick has made to our environment by using wind power.

We were going to take the ferry from Riviere du Loup to Saint Simeon because we were headed for Tadoussac for two nights. We got there two hours early as there are no reservations so were in the first of 8 or 10 lines about 10 cars back. This was going to be a full ship. About half an hour before sailing our line started to move so we filed out like sheep. We left the parking area and headed out toward the highway. My first instinct was "Hey, there's no boat here." I thought maybe the ship could not dock here, after all it was low tide, so we had to meet it somewhere else. After about ten minutes on the highway I thought WTF we're not going to any boat. Two hours later we were in Quebec City.

It took us three hours to get out and headed back north on the other side of the river. The problem was both our GPS's took us to highways whose access was closed and barricaded. It was 8 o'clock by the time we found a place in Baie Saint Paul in the Charlevoix region of Quebec. That means we will only have one day in Tadoussac. We called them and tried to get a second day added to our current booking. They were good enough to not charge us for cancelling today as we were well past the cancellation cutoff but were full for the day after our booking.

                                   The Charlevoix region is gorgeous - no, there are no moose.

We're nearing the end so I hope there are no more days like today.